Posted on 02/13/2026 9:24:28 PM PST by T.B. Yoits
It reads like an ordinary patent. A citizen of the United States, living in Weber County, Utah, has invented “certain new and useful improvements in firearms.” No fanfare. No grand claims. Just a statement of fact. Yet those lines would lead to a sidearm that rode in the holsters of American troops from the muddy trenches of World War I to the jungles of Vietnam, and into the hands of special operations units long after it was officially replaced.
On February 14, 1911, U.S. Patent No. 984,519 was issued to a quiet Ogden man: John Moses Browning. The document itself is dry and formal. But the words in its opening lines carry weight. That preamble marks the birth of the pistol that would become the Colt M1911.
The 1911 was carried by Marines on Pacific islands, paratroopers in Normandy, tunnel rats in Southeast Asia, and contractors on dusty roads half a century later. Steel, .45 caliber, and built to work when everything else had gone wrong.
Its entire history can be traced back to that one page, stamped and filed on a cold February day in 1911.
(Excerpt) Read more at sofmag.com ...
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The best semi auto side arm ever made. With the possible exception of the high power.
Still my favorite, and the platform I shoot best.
Still a masterpiece.
My 1911’s are all great guns. They share space in the safe with but one other handgun...a Dan Wesson 15-2 in .357magnum, which I carried on LEO duty back in the day.
Same. Trigger that breaks like glass.
I inherited my grandfather’s 1911 that he carried in France during WW 1. The date stamp on it is 1913. Still fires like new. Sometime back in the 30’s, my great grandmother saw a rat in their clawfoot bathtub. She calmly retrieved the 1911 and shot the rat, blowing a huge hole in the back of the tub.
Everyone should own a 1911.
Nice pic - mine was manufactured in the Springfield Armory in 1914. Still has the half-blued magazines.
Wonderful pistol. Especially in brushed silver with gold trigger!
What do I win?
The gift of a 1911. Now that’s LOVE!
....true...and there are whole bunches of Model 1911A1 versions out there....(the “A” stands for “alteration” if my memory serves me right......)...
Some things they get right the first time. The .45 ACP is one of them.
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